


Copper and Ebony

by rWolfWrites



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Rhaegar Won, Eddard Stark is King in the North, F/M, Ghost kills Littlefinger, I wrote this so fast today, I'm busy, Independent North (ASoIaF), It's gonna be my version of NaNo, Jonsa Week 2019, Only One Bed, Political!Jon, Tropes, ghost POV, lets get it, more modern AU, okay, season 8 AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-19
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-13 02:03:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21486526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rWolfWrites/pseuds/rWolfWrites
Summary: It's Jonsa Week!!Day 1 - 11/18 - Past/Present/Future -> Lord Baelish struggles to get a foothold in Winterfell.Day 2 - 11/19 - Quotes/Colours/Tropes -> *gasps* there was only one bedDay 3 - 11/20 - Winterfell/King's Landing/Castle Black -> Sansa tried to convince Jon to stay in the North while King's Landing is sieged.Day 4 - 11/21 - Songs/Myths/Lies -> He says it is duty that draws him to her rooms night after night. He does not know when it became a lie.Day 5 - 11/22 - Dragons/Wolves/Birds -> Something with Ghost I guess?Day 6 - 11/23 - Modern/Historical/Remix -> It started innocently. No, not innocently. It started in a blaze of red and fury.Day 7 - 11/24 - Bastards/Royalty/Free Space -> He is Heir to the Six Kingdoms when he first meets Winterfell's eldest princess.
Relationships: Jon Snow/Sansa Stark
Comments: 64
Kudos: 279





	1. Past/Present/Future

When Petyr Baelish tried to find Sansa, she had vanished. Every single time. It did not matter the time of day, it did not matter the place she was meant to be, it did not matter what she was supposedly doing. Without fail, she was gone, and there was no one who could tell him where she had gone.

Petyr Baelish was not an impatient man. He was not foolish. When frustrated, he turned his efforts down different avenues.

But the North was not the South. Even the small folk were different, when they had no right to be. His mistakes haunted him here in ways they didn’t haunt him in the South.

He didn’t mind a rumor about him, truthful or not. But it was not a rumor, it was perhaps his greatest mistake, and not one Northerner could allow him to forget it.

“He sold Lady Sansa to the Boltons.”

He tried to say it was in the past, that he had learned from his mistake, but when it was so blatantly obvious that even Sansa herself didn’t forgive him, there was little he could do.

And he knew there was exactly one person in the position to help him. Jon Snow, King in the North. If he could get Jon on his side, not only would Northerners accept him, but there would undoubtedly be a wedge driven between Jon and Sansa, a wedge he could use to get Sansa to allow him back in her good graces.

Jon Snow just might’ve been stupid enough to fall for it, and Sansa was essentially looking for ways to be betrayed these days. It was almost perfect, except there was something Petyr Baelish did not yet know.

<~|~>

He meant to catch her as she readied for bed, to put her immediately on the defensive. He had heard rumor of her scars, and she would not turn her back to him if they were visible. He would be able to corner her quite easily.

Lady Brienne was not to be found, his sole stroke of luck, though he perceived it to be a good omen at the time. Since young Bran had returned, the lady warrior had spent time split between Sansa and him, though she still remained with Sansa a majority of the time. Honestly, the young boy had been more help than hinderance, given his not wanting Jon’s crown or Sansa’s title of Lady. No doubt his crippling included certain vital parts and he’d never have heirs to usurp either one. It served Baelish well, one more loose end effectively tied off.

He knocked on Sansa’s door, tucking his hands behind his back. He debated his positioning—should he step away a little to give her some distance and slowly put her off in other ways, or should he press close to the doorway, upsetting her early and offering no chance of recovery? He reminded himself that he needed her trust, at least temporarily, as she was a willful thing who would have to be dragged with him a little ways until she saw the benefit of his patronage again.

He took a step back and squared himself again. He thought her heard a low voice on the other side of the door, and it was his only warning that she might not be alone before the door flew open.

Even having run brothels for as long as he had, it took a moment for Baelish to recognize the state Jon Snow was in when he opened the door.

His undershirt was half tucked into his breeches, though it was a sorry effort and it was almost painfully obvious that he’d just thrown the shirt on. It hung loosely from him, clean white and near enough displaying the top of his chest. Were he a woman, it would be quite the scandalous show. He was bare footed, his hair was quite frankly more of a mess than usual, his chest heaving, his cheeks pink, his face twisted with rage.

A man interrupted in the midst of carnal delights.

Before Baelish had half a chance to even think of an appropriate foul oath, the door had shut (leaving him no chance to see Sansa’s present state), and the King in the North had him pinned against the far wall with a hand over his throat.

“The fuck do you think you’re doing here at this time of night,” Snow snarled at him. Baelish clawed at his hand, his toes scraping against the stones. He had been threatened by Starks since Brandon dueled him over Catelyn, and it was far too frequent an occurrence since. “You thought you’d just slip into Sansa’s chambers and she’d let you crawl into her bed?”

Baelish rasped out a spare few words with difficulty. “You’re- one to- talk-“

He wheezed as the press against his windpipe doubled. “I know what you want, Baelish. You’ll never be King. She’ll never be yours.”

Baelish fell as the weight against him vanished. He coughed, rubbing at his throat.

“If you ever scheme to take what is mine again, and I’ll kill you myself.”

<~|~>

It was not ten months later that he found himself on his knees before them both. Sansa wore a crown now, twin direwolves meeting over her brow, one ducked beneath the other. He could not understand the subservience of the design. Her hair was unbound, auburn cascading to her waist. Her gown was the North incarnate, and there was nothing of his influence there. Tully scaling over her bodice, but no feathers. Not even the silhouette of them.

Jon matched her, the same crimson leaves decorating his sleeves as those that climbed up hers. The scales over his chest were not those of a fish but those of a dragon. His crown was a darker metal, Dragonglass gleaming in spiked leaves circling his head.

There were too many of the wrong eyes on him, and none of the right ones.

For even Sansa looked at him with disgust.

“You betrayed our father to his death. You sold our sister to the men who murdered our mother, brother, sister-by-law, and their babe. The men who tortured Theon Greyjoy, a brother in all but blood. The men who killed our youngest brother,” Arya Stark said. She was small, yes, but there was an air about her that screams of her dangerous ways.

“You killed Joffrey Lannister and let Sansa be blamed for it,” said Bran. “You had our aunt Lysa kill Jon Arryn. You pushed her from the Moon Door yourself.”

Jon held up a hand, and his once-siblings, now-cousins fell quiet. They all stared at Baelish, their eyes bright like the wolves that trailed them. One at Bran’s side, one at Sansa’s, one in the godswood. It was Ghost, curled up at Sansa’s feet, that unsettled him most. He had not been seen away from her side in nearly two months.

“Would you like to beg for your life?” Jon said. Baelish glanced around the room. Northern lords watched, hands upon their swords. “Would you take the black? Would you like a trial by combat?”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand the charges, my lord,” he said slowly. He needed time. There was a way out. There had to be.

“You betrayed our father to the Gold Cloaks, do you deny it?” Sansa said.

“I did not know Joffrey would-“

“Do you deny it?”

“No, I-“

“You and Olenna Tyrell killed the bastard Joffrey Lannister and blamed Tyrion and I for it, do you deny it?”

“Are you complaining that he is dead-“

“Do you deny it?”

“I do not-“

“You pushed Aunt Lysa from the Moon Door, do you deny it?”

“She wanted you dead-“

“Are you incapable of answering simple questions?” Jon snapped. Baelish straightened.

“No, my lord.”

“You’re charged with murder, on multiple counts.”

“I was protecting Sansa-“

Jon pushed to his feet. “Keep her name out of your mouth.” Sansa touched his arm. Baelish ached to understand what had so firmly turned her from him. She was meant to be his queen, not her bastard half-brother’s.

“I was protecting the Queen at a time when no one else could-“

“You were grooming her,” said Bran. Baelish grit his teeth. “You thought she was stupid, easy to manipulate. You knew our mother would never allow you near her, even after Father died, and you turned to our sister. You wanted to be her savior, and you turned everyone who tried to help her against her.”

“I deny that-“

“I have tolerated you far longer than you deserve,” Jon took a step forward, down the dais toward him. Arya moved to his side, silent as a shadow.

“May I ask why you have decided to put me on trial now, when all these things happened many years past?”

Sansa took something from her side and threw it at him. It fell to his feet. It was a small pouch, and a cold dread filled him.

“You told the serving girl to brew Sansa’s tea with it,” Jon spat. “She did not know the herb, she brought it to Maester Wolkan. You intended to keep Sansa barren until what? I chose another wife? I allowed a different man into our bed?”

“I was under the impression-“

“I will protect the future of my house,” said Arya Stark. “If that means removing you-“

“There’s no _if_ anymore,” said Sansa tightly. Jon backed up to Sansa’s side, and as he took one of her hands, her other came to rest over her stomach.

_No._

Gods, he’d miscalculated them again. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t let himself underestimate them again, and here he was. He couldn’t take the black. The wildlings in the force would recognize him, kill him for whatever slight they could. Jon wouldn’t punish them for it. Hells, he’d no doubt thank them.

He had to stall.

“I demand a trial by combat.”

“Very well,” Jon smiled, which Baelish didn’t like at all. There was no godly reason for that little smile, not when his queen sat beside him stone-faced. “Sansa, who shall be our champion?”

She looked up at Jon. Baelish doubted a man in the room failed to see the concern in her eyes. Baelish let the smallest breath from his tightened chest. She would not pick her king. It was too dangerous, not because he was unskilled but because she could not bear to lose him. Baelish would take him from her, one way or another, and she would be his, as it was meant to be.

“Arya.”

“I accept.”

That was not good.

Jon nodded, then gazed out amongst the Northern lords. “And Lord Baelish. Should you like a champion?”

Baelish turned to Lord Royce, visiting for but a few moons. The man shook his head. “It shall not be me, my King.”

“I would call for-“

“This is the North. If you have no Northern champion, you will not have one at all,” said Sansa. Her gaze lifted to the lords beyond. None dared speak a word. Damn her, she had power because of him, only him, didn't she see?

He would make her. She was merciful, it was her weakness.

Baelish dropped to his knees, splaying his hands. She did not so much as blink. “Sansa, please, I have always loved you, from our first meeting.”

Jon glanced at her, but she did not move. Arya stared at him with a similar unwavering gaze. Baelish looked toward Lord Royce again, and found him smirking. Ghost growled from Sansa's feet.

"May I?"

Jon nodded. "Yes."

"If you don't stand up, I'll slit your throat," said Arya Stark. Baelish could not even look at her. She would not move without Sansa's consent, she wouldn't and Sansa hadn't given it yet.

“Sansa-“

The Stark girl was quick. The last thing he saw was his own dagger, slicing through the air, as a Stark smiled down at him.


	2. Quotes/Colours/*Tropes*

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sansa and Jon, trapped by a snowstorm on their drive North, find themselves at a no-tell motel type with one room left--one bed too.
> 
> Modern AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh all y'all commenters making me so happy and excited to write more

“Are you joking?” Sansa demanded. The elderly innkeeper blinked slowly. “We’re in the middle of nowhere, in a blizzard, and you’ve got a room left?”

“Just the one, yes.”

“Thank the gods,” she breathed. “What do I owe you? Just the night, we’re headed to Wintertown.”

“Wintertown, eh? Couple hours on a summer day in a nice car,” Sansa passed over her ID and credit card. “Where’re you coming from to get here so late?”

“Long story,” Sansa said. “There was a detour and—with the blizzard and all. It’s a miracle I’m alive with that idiot at the wheel all day.”

“Oh,” the woman looked up, her glasses making her eyes look unnaturally large. “You said- Your partner, is it?”

Sansa snorted, though her cheeks started to burn. She hadn’t said a damn thing about him, and this woman could detect her crush? What a nightmare. “No, he’s my brother’s friend. Best friend, I suppose. We’re carpooling.”

“Oh, dear. Um, there’s just the one bed love. Not even a pull-out couch, I’m afraid. Is that all right?”

Just. One. Bed.

Why did the gods hate her?

“Yeah,” Sansa said tightly. The older woman smiled widely, passing back her card and ID. “It’s fine. He’s, uh . . . It’s fine.”

She couldn’t even lie and say he was like a brother, not with her face burning as it was.

“Good,” the innkeeper smiled. “Room 14. Right across the lot. Give it a good shoulder if it sticks.”

“Um, right, thanks,” Sansa took the key as well. She zipped her coat halfway, looped her pale blue infinity scarf thrice around her neck, zipped the coat up further, pulled on her bright white hat, tugged her hood over her head, zipped up a last little bit, fit her hands into two pairs of gloves at once, and pulled the scarf to cover her nose. “Thank you.”

She gripped the key tightly in her pocket as she stepped outside. The wind bit at the gap between her eyebrows and her hat. She shuffled quickly across the slick parking lot, reaching Jon’s car quickly. She slipped into the passenger seat, fighting the wind to get the door shut.

“Room 14,” she said, reaching into the back for her overnight bag. Jon grabbed a duffel bag and turned the car off, locking it as they made a mad dash for their room. Sansa’s hands shook too much to unlock the door, her fingers almost refusing to hold the key at all. Jon pulled his glove off with his teeth, took the key, and unlocked the door, shoving it open with his shoulder. Sansa danced inside, and he slammed the door shut behind them. Sansa felt along the wall in utter darkness until she found a light switch. She flicked it on.

“One bed,” Jon said softly. Sansa threw her bag on the bed, then took Jon’s and set it beside hers. It wasn’t even that large a bed, likely comfortable only for two people already very comfortable with each other.

She and Jon were not those two people.

“Last room,” Sansa sighed. “You drove and didn’t kill us, I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“You paid,” Jon shook his head. “I’ll sleep on the floor.”

Sansa glowered, pulling her hood off, then her hat and scarf. She stamped her feet, trying to feel her toes in her socks. “Yeah, I paid so I get to decide the sleeping arrangements.”

She tucked her gloves in her coat pockets, jumping slightly as Jon threw his gloves onto the desk at the foot of the bed. He shrugged out of his coat. Sansa noted his glasses fogging as he pulled them off. “Thought you wanted me to be more gentlemanly, Sansa. You’ve gotta let me take the floor.”

“I don’t have to do anything,” Sansa said. Jon frown at his glasses and set them on the desk. She pulled out of her coat. He held out a hand and she gave it to him. “That’s gentlemanly enough for right now, thanks.”

Jon put their coats up by the door and yanked his boots off. “You need to change your socks.”

Sansa looked down at her tennis shoes, thoroughly soaked. She’d forgotten her boots in Winterfell the last time she’d left. She sat on the bed and pried them off, wincing at her wet socks before peeling them off too. Her toes were oddly pale, and Sansa massaged them with her fingers for a moment, wincing at how cold they really were.

Jon stepped close enough that his leg brushed hers as he dug through his bag. “You really didn’t prepare for this, did you?”

“All my winter things are at Winterfell because this doesn’t ever happen South of the Neck so why should it take up space in my already tiny apartment?” Sansa grumbled, rubbing her toes between the palms of her hands. Jon threw something into her lap, a pair of wool socks that looked thick and warm. She didn’t question it, pulling them on without hesitating. Jon grabbed her shoes and put them next to his boots by the door. The socks reached to her knees, almost. She groaned and stood up.

She had three layers of leggings and a pair of shorts under her jeans (an older pair she used when she was painting that were usually too big). She started pulling them off, but Jon grabbed her wrists before she could unbutton them.

“What are you doing?”

“Let go of me.”

“Robb finds out you stripped in front of me and I’m a dead man.”

“I’m not stripping, I’m in layers, let go of me,” Sansa hissed. Jon looked down at her, his dark eyes burning almost as much as his hands around her wrists. Gods, he was attractive. There was still a flush in his cheeks from the cold. Sansa tugged him closer slightly. A bad idea, but the only thing she could think to do. He had no right to smell as good as he did after eight hours in a car. Sansa must’ve gone mad. He didn’t step away. Didn’t look away. “You’re staring.”

“So’re you,” he said. The wind howled outside, the snow still falling in droves. Sansa pulled out of Jon’s grip, but his hands fell to her waist. She touched his chest lightly, leaning closer to him. “D’you mean what you said in the car?”

_He did the stupid impression again. “I’m Sansa Stark, and I’m pretty and smart and perfect with long legs and pretty hair-“_

_“You said pretty twice.”_

_“-and a shitty taste in men-“_

_“Okay, counting yourself in that?” She said, not at all thinking about the words tumbling away from her._

_“Beg your pardon?”_

_Jon nearly ran them off the road with how long he gaped at her._

“Jon, you . . . I-“

A phone blared a Northern drinking song on the fiddle, and Jon nearly jumped through the Seven Hells and back. He stepped away from Sansa and grabbed his phone from his coat, pacing into the little cupboard of a bathroom.

Sansa took a deep breath, telling herself she was shaking because of the cold but slipping out of her many layers despite it. The heater was cranked on high, and a second space heater sat beside the bed, blasting warm air out. She felt stupid in the long wool socks, a dull sort of grey-green, and bright yellow synthetic running shorts. She pulled off her hoodie, then her t-shirt, then the long-sleeved tee, until she was in nothing but the little pale pink tank-top with its stupid shelf bra. She’d figured that morning there was no need for a real bra if she’d be in the car with Jon all day. Now, she was too tired to care. She sat on the bed, resting her chin in her hand. The bed was one of the creakiest she’d ever touched. She could all but see the rusty metal springs.

“No, Mr. Stark, we’re well past Moat Cailin. . . . I’m not sure exactly. Hard to tell with all the snow, really,” Jon’s voice came low and calm. Sansa pushed her way fully onto the bed, lying on her side, using her arm as a pillow. She stared at the dingy yellow wall. “Honestly, I’m not even sure what this place is called, don’t tell Ms. Catelyn. We’re not going to get murdered, I’m pretty sure. . . . Right, exactly. . . . Yes. Right, well. D’you need to talk to Sansa? . . . She hasn’t had service for three hours, we’re not sure what’s up.”

Yes, her phone had decided to crap out as she decided to shove her foot in her mouth. Three hours, alone in the car, with Jon, who was smug and handsome and stupid and funny and-

Jon wandered out of the bathroom. He stared at her, blinking slowly. Sansa lazily met his gaze. Then his eyes darted back to her legs. Sansa bit her lip, raising her eyebrows.

“_Ahem_, here she is,” Jon passed her his phone.

“Hi, Dad,” Sansa said, falling onto her back.

“Jon says you’ll be home tomorrow.”

“I know, Dad. We’re just not quite sure where we are at the moment.”

“Be nice to Jon.”

“I’m always nice to Jon,” Sansa said. She could feel his eyes on her as she rolled onto her stomach, kicking her feet up into the air. A dull thunk sounded behind her and she glanced back to see him beating his forehead into the wall. She rolled her eyes. “I like Jon, you know that . . . He’s easily the best of Robb’s shitty little friends.”

“Hey!”

She stuck her tongue out at him.

“Sansa,” her father said. She could hear the smile in his voice. “Just mind you’re not _too_ nice to him.”

“Dad!”

He chuckled lowly. “Have a good night, sweetheart. Hand me back to him?”

“Yeah, love you, too,” Sansa got up, passing the phone to Jon and grabbing her toiletries. She brushed her teeth and washed her face. She hoped she could blame that for how red her cheeks were.

Jon was about as red when she came out of the bathroom. “Your dad’s going to castrate me.”

“That’s very unlikely,” Sansa said shortly, moving to shove her toiletries back in her overnight. She stuffed the layers she’d shed in too. She could feel Jon watching her.

“He said it just now.”

“Jon-“

“I used to wonder where Robb got it from-“

“Oh, Robb gets it from Mum and you know it,” Sansa turned to face him. He was smiling a tiny little smile he couldn’t hide. “Are you making fun of me?!”

“No,” his mouth flattened out into a stern line, but his eyes shone.

“What- Eight hours alone in a car and you think you get to poke fun at me?!”

“Yeah, considering you were staring at me for seven of those hours,” he shrugged one shoulder, sitting on the bed.

“I changed my mind,” Sansa lifted her chin. “Sleep on the bloody floor.”

“But I’m ever so comfy now,” Jon pouted.

“I’m going to kill you,” Sansa vowed.

“Is that before or after you lie in bed all teasing-like again? I’d like to suggest after,” Jon grinned broadly at her. She dove past him to grab a pillow, solidly walloping him over the head with it. He turned slowly to face her where she lay in bed behind him. “Did you just smack me with a pillow?” She did it again. “Do that one more time and I’ll-“

How could she not try once more, with a threat like that?

He grabbed the pillow and threw it into the corner past her head. “You missed- Jon!”

She thrashed as his fingers danced along her sides, giggling uncontrollably. He pressed over her, keeping her from escape as he laughed at her distress. She tried to shove at him in vain once or twice, but his body was hard and unrelenting against her.

“Jon, stop it, stop it, stoppit-“

He sat back for a moment, looking down at her. When she tried to roll away, he dropped one elbow to either side of her head. Sansa’s breath caught.

“You like me,” he whispered.

“Smug-fucking-bastard-ass-prick,” Sansa hissed. Jon smiled over her, and it was one of the most handsome things she’d ever seen.

“You’re beautiful,” Jon murmured.

“Robb’s going to kill us.”

“Us?”

She slipped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. “Yeah. Us.”

She really couldn’t tell if he kissed her before she kissed him, but it didn’t matter because they were kissing and damn if it wasn’t the best thing to happen to her in months.

“Robb and your mum-“

“Don’t talk about my mum right now,” Sansa let her hands slip into his hair, tugging him back to her. Gods, he was warm. He sucked her lower lip into his mouth and bit her lightly. Sansa moaned softly, pressing up into him.

“Yeah, we can take them,” Jon grinned against her.

“Mm, shut up.”


	3. Winterfell/King's Landing/Castle Black

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sansa refuses to let Jon go South to fight at King's Landing without a plan of her own. Luckily, Jon's laid the groundwork.
> 
> And guess what, she didn't fail geography!

“The last time you went South you tried to give away our kingdom!” Sansa said, pointing at the door. Podrick stood on the other side of it, she knew. Honestly, she wasn’t in much of a state for argument, but she couldn’t let Jon go. She couldn’t.

“I’m her ally, she expects-“

“She’s sending Gendry back to Storm’s End. The Riverlands aren’t offering any help. The Vale—Robyn isn’t going. We’re still vulnerable _here,_” Sansa said heatedly.

“I won’t send my men where I won’t go!”

“Then none of you should go! They’ve just fought walking nightmares, they’re not ready for another battle, most of them are still injured, they won’t make it in time to help the way she wants.”

“She’s an ally!”

“Then she should act like it!” Sansa snapped. “Honestly, did you mean anything you said before you left?!”

“Of course, I did!”

“Oh, so the North being your home, being part of you, it doesn’t matter anymore because your father wasn’t the Stark-“

“I _gave you_ the North,” Jon’s voice dropped. “I gave it to _you_, so she couldn’t force me to kneel in the South. I never swore her allegiance. I was never on my knees before her. She never asked, she doesn’t know our ways. I’ve never said she was our Queen, she’s not even my Queen, she’s just _the_ Queen.”

“In King’s Landing, with Cersei-“ Sansa frowned. Jon nodded. “You never said you’d knelt. You just said you were allies.”

“Allies,” Jon nodded. “Not subjects.”

Indeed, had she ever heard even Davos refer to Daenerys Targaryen as his Queen? No one had witnessed Jon kneeling not just because he’dnever knelt, but because she’d isolated him. Sansa’s smile spread slowly.

“I can work with this,” she whispered.

“That’s why I-“ Jon stepped closer, his eyes pained. “Did you honestly think I was that stupid?”

“I-“ Sansa looked away from him, lacing her own fingers together. She hated that she couldn’t meet his eyes anymore. For all their talk of trust, she’d lost faith in him. “I didn’t know what to think.”

“Winterfell is ours,” Jon said softly, coming closer still. Sansa fought the urge to run. Her breath was yet too short from the argument, and she could see the sharp rise and fall of Jon’s own chest. “It’s our home. That’s what you said at Castle Black.”

“I know,” Sansa lifted her chin, meeting his gaze. “Don’t go to King’s Landing. Just- Don’t leave me- Don’t leave me alone here.”

“Sansa, Arya and Bran-“

“Bran hasn’t recovered from the Night King yet,” Sansa said softly. She still wasn’t sure what the Three-Eyed Raven meant, what it was, how it worked. But the mark the Other had given him, it had hurt him somehow as the Night King approached. Their Bran had started to peek through the strange new one, though he was prone to visions and seizing that could bring him falling to the floor even from his chair. Tyrion had suggested fitting a strap and Sansa had never wanted to smack a man more, practical or not.

“He’ll make it,” Jon said lowly. “And Arya-“

“Didn’t you notice Gendry drunk to his bones?” Sansa laughed incredulously. “Jon, you can’t tell me- I spoke to him for all of two minutes. Arya told him they’d talk about his new lordship only when Cersei was dead. And she left.”

“She left? She’s going to King’s Landing?!”

“Yes, which is why you have to stall Daenerys,” Sansa grabbed his arm. “Why you can’t go. What’ll she do when she finds out one of us killed both the Night King and the Mad Queen? She’ll think Arya is trying to out do her. She’ll turn on us.”

“She’ll turn on us before then if I don’t march with her.”

“There’s no one to march with. Grey Worm said there were five hundred Unsullied left. Five hundred. The Dothraki are even worse off but can’t be counted. Her fleet is all but destroyed. One dragon dead, one injured, the last prone to eating children. The North has three thousand fighting men remaining. Cersei has the Golden Company. Westeros won’t survive—we won’t survive—if we don’t stop all the bloody fighting and start rebuilding.”

“They won’t follow me when they learn I’m a Targaryen.”

“You’re not one of them,” Sansa said fiercely. Jon clenched his jaw, turning away from her. She touched his chin and made him look at her. “You’re a Stark. You’ve always been a Stark.”

“We’re trapped,” Jon said softly.

“No,” Sansa shook her head. “She is.”

“You tell her I never knelt and she’ll marry me with a dragon over either of our shoulders and you in chains,” Jon said. Sansa let her hand fall away from him, looking across her solar at the desk. She knew no answers lay in the piles of scrolls, but Sam and Gilly had found hope in a pile of scrolls. Jon shifted closer. “She’ll claim the North that way if she has to.”

“If what she says is true and she’s barren, that will only give you more power. She makes you King, or even just King-consort, and no one will ever listen to her again,” Sansa shook her head. Jon rolled his eyes, and Sansa pressed on. “If she doesn’t know that, Varys and Tyrion must.”

“You think she’ll listen to anyone so long as she has a single dragon?” Jon hissed. “And we can’t be desperate-“

“We _are_ desperate!” Sansa exclaimed, gesturing between them. There was so little space she nearly smacked Jon in the chest. “There’s a tyrant in our home, Jon, one who wants to take it from us or kill us and take it, who wants to separate us-“

“I won’t let her,” Jon grabbed her hand. Sansa shook her head. “You know I won’t let her touch you-“

“And I wouldn’t let her hurt you,” Sansa said. “But we’ll burn together nonetheless-“

“Then we’ll burn _together_,” Jon said. His eyes captured hers. “I’d have it no other way.”

“There is something we can do,” Sansa wet her lips. “But . . . Your heritage will have to come out, your true heritage. It all has to happen together, so she doesn’t know. And we’ll have to do everything properly.”

Jon’s eyes were dark, consuming her. “I trust you.” He brought her hand to rest over his heart. She felt it thump away, somewhat wild even as his breathing steadied. “I trust you.”

<~|~>

“I beg your pardon?” The Dragon Queen looked at Sansa as though she was a child insisting on spending the day naked. Sansa smiled, gesturing to the chair beside her. The hair on her neck stood up even from this—sitting while Daenerys Targaryen stood.

“I thought we could talk about Cersei, before you face her either in battle or negotiations,” Sansa said easily. The Unsullied by the door did not so much as blink. Brienne stood faithfully behind her, the wound over her shoulder unable to keep her more than a dozen paces from Sansa’s side. Jaime Lannister was out in the hall.

“I don’t need to talk about her. I can beat her.”

“That’s what my brother Robb thought. That’s what Stannis Baratheon thought. Both Kings. Both gone now,” Sansa said. She poured two mugs of ale out of a dull metal pitcher, knowing the Queen preferred wine. She bristled even as she sat and took the cup.

“I’m not a _false_ King, and they didn’t have dragons.”

Sansa hid her smirk as Daenerys coughed through her first swallow of ale. She waited for the Queen to recover before leaning forward. “Do you mind if I’m honest with you?”

“I welcome it,” Daenerys gave her a soft but winning smile. Oh, how she must manipulate men. The ire in her eyes suggested that she would hear Sansa’s truths and behave however she wanted. She did much claiming not to be spoiled or entitled for how much she acted it.

“You can take King’s Landing right now, but it won’t make you the Queen of the Six Kingdoms.”

“I’m sorry, what kingdom did I lose?” Daenerys frowned, her head tilting slightly to the side.

“Well, the Reach is destroyed right now, all their crops and most their soldiers burned. Dorne is in the midst of turmoil after you backed the Sand Snakes and let them be murdered. The Iron Isles are no better off; Riverrun is controlled by my uncle, a puppet for the Lannisters. The Westerlands are empty. The Stormlands haven’t had a true lord in years. The Vale’s men are here, still recovering from the Great War, and I highly doubt any of the hill tribes are willing to serve you,” Sansa watched as the Queen’s nostrils flared wider, her eyebrows knitting together. _What kingdom haven’t you lost? Do you even know where each of these places are on a map? _“And the North has been independent since my father died and my brother was crowned King in the North.”

“You forget, Lady Sansa, that your brother knelt to me.”

“I believe you’ll find that he didn’t.”

“I beg your pardon.” Despite her choice of words, the Queen’s tone of voice fell far from begging. Sansa heard Brienne shift behind her. The Unsullied guard took a too sharp breath. Sansa smiled Daenerys Targaryen’s own winning smile at her. Soft and charming and beautiful, easy to hide behind when men were around.

“We’re not as simple a people as we may seem,” Sansa said. “Jon went to Dragonstone to treat with you, but he did not leave Winterfell with the full authority of the King in the North. He gave me charge of it, and I swore by the Weirwood tree on the Gods of the First Men to protect it. From that moment, _I_ was the only one capable of giving up sovereignty of the North. Jon was only capable of treating for allies, treaties which had to be approved by _me_.”

“He knelt to me,” the Queen said coldly.

“Did he? Was he on his knees before you as you stood? Did he swear fealty to you on the Old Gods?” Sansa lifted an eyebrow at the Queen’s fury. “On the new? On the Lord of Light, even? Who bore witness to his kneeling?”

“Jon _knelt._”

“He was the only Northman on a ship full of foreign soldiers. As I understand it, you pledged yourself to the Great War and Jon agreed to help in your war against Cersei,” said Sansa. “To have expected anything more . . . Well, I suppose we shouldn’t have expected you to know the culture of Westeros.”

_You’re ignorant. You can’t rule a people well when you don’t understand them._

Queen Daenerys stood hastily, her anger clenching her fists and twisting her face. “I am _your_ _Queen_.”

Sansa rose slowly, her movements measured, untouched by any emotion. “You are a Queen, and I do respect you in that, which is why I will warn you about Cersei. She believes fear is the way to rule Westeros. It is a temporary solution only. Look at what happened to Joffrey, to the Boltons. Even Robert Baratheon.”

“Lady Sansa, your brother-“

“My cousin,” Sansa said. Daenerys went white as a sheet. Brienne cleared her throat quietly.

“What are you talking about.”

“Samwell Tarly informed the Citadel when he found an old Maester’s record, annulling Rhaegar’s marriage to Elia, detailing a second marriage to Lyanna Stark, resulting in the birth of a boy with the Stark look in the Tower of Joy. That boy was retrieved by Lord Eddard Stark,” Sansa recounted carefully. She heard Brienne shift again. “Robert Baratheon wanted every Targaryen dead. My father saved Jon’s life by claiming him as his bastard. But he never was. He already told you this.”

“It’s treason,” Daenerys whispered.

“If you claim the Iron Throne based on your birth right, when Jon has better claim, than I would argue you to be the one committing treason,” said Sansa coolly. Daenerys’s cheeks slowly went pink. The anger was coming, then.

“Who else knows?” Sansa held her violet eyes silently. “Who else did you tell?”

“Lord Davos Seaworthy. Lady Alys Karstark. Ser Jaime Lannister. Tormund Giantsbane,” Sansa said easily. Each new name caused Daenerys to flinch and grab her mug of ale tighter. Sansa sipped easily from her own. “Oh, Gendry Baratheon, my sister, Arya. Bran knew. Or the Three-Eyed Raven did.”

_You couldn’t kill a single one of them without turning people against you. Davos would lose you just about anyone who knew him. Alys most the fighting men. Jaime your own Hand. Tormund the Free Folk. You’ve just naturalized Gendry, to kill him now? Arya would lose you Jon, not that you ever had him. Bran contains the memories of the entire human race, killing him was the Others’ goal._

“Jon can keep the North, or you can take the Seven Kingdoms with him at your side. Do you think the people will love him more than they fear you?” Sansa asked aloud.

“You’ll both burn for treason first-“

“Then you’ll have to burn all the Northmen, for none shall follow you without him,” said Sansa. She folded her hands in front of her. “Nor will the Vale follow without me. You’ll have destroyed four Kingdoms, left two in uprising, and given the last a bastard-born Lord who’s never done anything other than smithed. There won’t be anyone left to love or fear you. You’ll only be the last Targaryen—again.”

Daenerys stared silently, her eyes dull and wild all at once. Sansa inclined her head, forcing herself still. Brienne marched toward the door, opening it and holding it for her.

She forced her feet to move, walking away. She hesitated at the door. Ser Jaime waited just before her, his armor dinged by battle. A scratch down his face and over his eye was beginning to heal. Sansa glanced over her shoulder. “Thank you, for allowing me to speak with honesty, your Grace. One Queen to another.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, next chapter, explicit, not explicit? Very much has the potential to be explicit, would y'allst like that written but in a separate work in a series tied to this? Let me know, I don't want to ruin anyone's Mature for foul language and ~themes~ vibes


	4. Songs/Myths/*Lies*

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Jon's duty as her husband to give her children. That's all. It's the only reason he's spent every night in her chambers since they wed. The only reason. Sole. Alone. No other possible reason for wanting to see Sansa writhing on the sheets beneath him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Idk if this counts as explicit or not, but it's like heeeaaavy implication at the very least.  
First time I wrote this it was 5000000% more angsty but I went with fluff and horniness instead

He used to hesitate at the door, no matter which emotion held him. He would hold a hand up to knock but remain as still as a statue. He would pace four steps to either side of the door. He would stare at the door and will it to open for him, hands clenched at his side. The Unsullied in the hall wouldn’t react no matter how long he hesitated or in what manner he did. The first time Jon hadn’t hesitated at all, for there had been two Unsullied flanking the door, Brienne of Tarth standing opposite them in the hall.

By the time two moons had passed, Jon had stopped hesitating before he knocked. By the time three moons had passed, he had stopped knocking.

Jon marched past the Unsullied, his feet too loud on the stones. Arya would call him oxen-footed. He didn’t care. He didn’t give a singular shit.

Even with anger fueling his steps, he opened and shut her door quietly. He refused to be the lord banging about his hold, sending servants and his own wife cowering at every sound. So no matter how much he’d currently like to throttle his wife, he refrained from moving more than a step into her rooms.

“What in Seven Hells did you tell Alys Karstark?!”

Sansa looked up from her work, sitting in a small chair by the hearth. Sam had set up some sort of glass lens for her to amplify the light so she could see her embroidery better. She no longer used it at her desk after she’d nearly burned her solar down. She had not found it as interesting a phenomena as Sam.

Sansa went back to her stitches. “I’m not in the mood to be yelled at, Jon.”

“She is refusing to marry!” Jon said. “We can’t say that all the North must focus on rebuilding infrastructure as well as population and have the second largest house refuse to-“

“I told her that if she’s to have children she should wait a little longer. She still just a girl-“

“She’s bled!”

“If that was the only qualification for womanhood than I suppose I was more than old enough to marry Tyrion when I did-“

“_Don’t do that.”_ Jon growled. She shrugged as he clenched and unclenched his fists, spinning in a slow circle and attempting to remind himself that Tyrion had never touched her, that he was no permitted to go to King’s Landing and kill the Hand. He contemplated walking back out the door and finding some poor man to spar with—Podrick, perhaps—to let his anger out, rather than his wife. But Sansa had been avoiding everyone all day, and if Jon didn’t spend at least some significant time in her rooms that night, there’d be a raven from King’s Landing asking if they’d given up on an heir. “Sansa, tell her-“

“I told her to court men. To choose one well-suited to the needs of her house,” said Sansa. “If there are no such men currently, she can wait a little while.”

“Sansa!”

“I’m not going to change my mind,” Sansa didn’t so much as look up from her work. “I was very reasonable with her. She’s hardly sixteen, and she’s scared out of her wits. I’d been married twice by her age, I’ve no right to tell her to trust a man blindly and have faith that the gods would work things out fairly. Go be angry elsewhere.”

“Oh, I’m just fine being angry here-“

Sansa eyes met his, cold and vicious. He wished he hadn’t spoken the words immediately. “These are _my_ rooms. This is _my bedroom._ If I want to have it out, I’ll ask to see you in my study. You can leave now.”

She went back to her work. Jon didn’t move, clasping his hands behind his back.

Perhaps if he were there for the sake of duty alone, he would have listened. He tried to tell himself it was duty alone that had him coming to his wife’s bedchamber every single night for three moons. He tried to tell himself it was his duty as a husband to wring every last drop of pleasure from her in bed. He tried to tell himself it had nothing to do with the way she cried his name, nothing to do with the way she called him her husband, nothing to do with the way she looked when she fell asleep on top of him.

He tried to tell himself he wasn’t in love with her.

_Liar, liar, liar._

He watched a tear drop from her focused face to her embroidery, and his feet pulled him across the room. He knelt before her, touching her chin lightly. “I’m sorry. We can discuss it tomorrow.”

“I’ve been in here all day,” Sansa murmured. “Where were you?”

“Meeting with all the lords who think it’s ever so funny that I took your name,” Jon smiled weakly. Sansa pulled back, away from him, covering her mouth with her hand. She shook from a sob. Jon swiped at his face for all of a moment before standing and picking her up, depositing her gently on the bed. He came around to lie beside her, and she crawled over him, resting her head over his heart. He breathed deeply, knowing she would try to match him, and ran his hand through her hair. “What happened?”

“I’ve just been in here all day by myself crying and I-“ Sansa picked at Jon’s doublet gently. “I’ve just been alone in here all day.”

“You could’ve come out-“

“But what if I started crying in front of everyone, what would I have done then?” Sansa shook her head, mussing her hair. Jon straightened it out with his fingers before it could tangle.

Though he did not plan to reveal the trajectory of his next thoughts to a single living soul, Jon tried to work backward through his memory to when her last bleeding had been. They’d been wed about a week before the first he could recall. And . . .

That was the only one he could recall.

It had been three months since-

Oh, _Gods._

“Sansa,” Jon whispered, his hand stilling against her head. “Are you-“ He cleared his throat before his voice could break. “Are you with child?”

She went still, too.

“Yes.”

Jon tried his very hardest to keep his voice even. “And . . . How long have you known?”

“Almost a month.”

“A _month?!_” He hissed. “You couldn’t tell me that- You didn’t- You should have told me!”

“Please don’t yell at me,” Sansa murmured.

“I’m not going to yell at you,” Jon assured her, taking a deep breath. She was with child. She was with child.

He would have a child. Sansa’s child. With her.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I haven’t been able to eat much,” Sansa said.

Jon was unable to keep the bitterness from his voice. “Is that why you’ve been unavailable to dine with me for-“

“Jon,” Sansa groaned. “I didn’t mean it as an offense, I just didn’t want to disturb you-“

“I am _disturbed_ that you didn’t tell me-“

“Jon, that’s not fair-“

“Sansa, unless you’ve been bedding someone else-“

“I would never!”

“-that child is _ours_,” Jon said. “Yours and mine. You don’t think I had to right to know of her very existence?!”

“_His_ existence,” Sansa picked up her head to glare at him.

Jon knew she didn’t mean it as the blow it felt to be. _His. Him. He. A boy. An heir. _They wouldn’t need to share a bed any longer if it was a boy.

“Sansa,” Jon sighed, touching her tear-lined cheek. “I wish you’d told me everything.”

“I was so tired, Jon,” Sansa rested her chin near his sternum, red-rimmed eyes watchful. It made them almost painfully blue. “I couldn’t eat much. I’m growing a babe. I just . . . You _know_ I don’t sleep well on my own. I just wanted . . . I didn’t mean to force you to lie with me. I know you don’t like it.”

She looked away from him, eyes so downcast as to force her wet eyelashes to mark her cheeks. Jon brushed his thumbs over her cheekbones, then leaned forward to kiss her brow.

“I don’t like making love to you because I know you don’t want to do it,” he said softly. “I don’t like the idea that I’m forcing you-“

Sansa’s eyes lifted back to his. “You’re not forcing me.”

“_Someone_ is,” Jon said darkly. “You didn’t want to marry me. I understand that-“

“I didn’t want to marry you because _someone else_ told me to,” Sansa said. “It had nothing to do with you. I don’t mind being married to you.”

“Oh, you don’t mind it?” Jon found himself smiling. “What a ringing endorsement.” Sansa smiled back, her cheeks growing steadily pinker. She mumbled something under her breath, and Jon chuckled, “What was that?”

“I said,” Sansa said clearly, before once more falling into mumbling. “I don’t mind the thing you do . . .”

“What thing I do?” Jon asked. “I do lots of things. Many of them with and to you-“

“Oh, like annoy me?” Sansa said.

“You’re very red, dearest wife,” Jon said, holding her face in his palm. She was warm, burning almost. “Which thing that I do is it that you like?”

“Thethingyoudowithyourtongue.”

“I didn’t hear you, love.”

“Yes, you did.”

“Mm, no, I didn’t.”

“Stop making fun of me.”

“I’m not making fun,” Jon grinned. “I think they should sing songs about the sounds you make when I put my tongue to you.”

“Jon,” Sansa whined.

“Love it when you do that,” he lifted himself enough to brush his lips across hers. He pulled back again, watching her. They didn’t kiss often. Usually only when she was already half-gone with pleasure and he was already inside her. Her eyes were closed for a moment, and when they fluttered open Jon smiled. She shifted before falling over him once more, her hair falling around his face and tickling his neck as she kissed him they way she did when they were joined.

“Would you have married me if we hadn’t been forced to?” Sansa asked softly.

Jon swallowed. “No.” Her face fell, but before she could pull away, Jon continued. “I would have wanted to. But you- I didn’t think you needed a husband.”

“I don’t,” Sansa murmured, her fingers trailing over his jaw. “Though, I must admit, sharing a bed with a man who . . . Who knows what to do is . . . Refreshing.”

“Refreshing?” Jon leaned up to kiss her again. “You mean to say I’ve made you positively depraved.”

“Will you spend the night here, even if you don’t have to?”

“I do have to,” Jon whispered. He lifted a hand to touch her cheek. “My wife has asked me to, and she carries my child. I’d do anything for either one of them.”

Sansa bit her lip. “You would?”

“If you hadn’t agreed to marry me, if they’d tried to punish you for it,” Jon held her eyes, feeling the truth to his bones. No more lies with her. Never again. “I would’ve killed everyone who threatened to lay a hand to you. I would’ve taken you and run to the true North, where even dragons couldn’t find us.”

“Why?”

“I’m in love with you.”

She kissed him again. “You are?”

“Yes.”

Her tongue dragged across his. “Good.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m in love with you too.”

“Excellent.”

Jon, with the utmost care, turned her so she’d be beneath him, settling between her thighs as easily as he had for the past month or more. She pulled at his clothes before he took her hands in his and laced their fingers together, pinning them back into the mattress.

“Jon,” Sansa murmured. “We don’t have to anymore.”

“Do you want to?”

Cheeks scarlet, she nodded. “I- I do. Yes. Sorry.”

“Don’t ever apologize to me for that.” Jon smiled. “Turn on your stomach and pull up your skirts.”

Her eyes widened. “Jon! That’s- It’s not how- but-“

He kissed her deeply, thoroughly. “Trust me.”

“It’s not proper.”

“Neither is bedding a woman with child, but what did you just ask me for?”

“Jon.”

“So many different ways you say my name, and I still love all of them,” Jon said. He pulled off her, undoing his doublet and shucking it across the room. He pulled at her stockings as she turned onto her stomach. He kissed the back of her neck, unlacing his trousers and kicking them off into the void beyond this bed, this woman. “Do you trust me?”

“Tell me what you’re doing?”

“I’m going to put my knees outside yours. Put this pillow under your stomach—there.” He kissed where her shoulder and neck met. “Is it okay that I’m over you like this?”

“Yes,” Sansa breathed, pushing her hips up and back until her ass was against Jon’s front. He groaned.

“Whoever said love was the death of duty was wrong,” he muttered, knowing it was Maester Aemon even as he said it. His relative Maester Aemon. Gods, what a mess, and something completely unrelated to the task at hand.

“Oh?”

“My duty as a husband is to honor you and protect you and fill you with babes,” Jon breathed into her ear. “And because I love you all of those things are my favorite things to do.”

“Please, Jon,” Sansa whined. “I’ve been waiting for you all day.”

She turned her head and he kissed her again. “I love you.”

He must’ve said the words a hundred times over by the time he collapsed to the bed beside her. She covered her eyes with the crook of her elbow, naked and covered in a glistening sheen of sweat, her chest heaving and cheeks flushed. Jon traced his fingers over her breasts.

“They’re readying for the babe,” Sansa hummed. He pinched one of her nipples and she brought her hand down over his chest sharply. “Ow! It’s sensitive, you oblivious ass.”

“I want to find out how sensitive,” he muttered. The idea of her peaking from no more than careful attentions to her breasts? What man wouldn’t try?

“You’re insatiable.”


	5. Dragons/Wolves/Birds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ghost copes with the absence of Jon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all getting a two for one special today cos I fell behind due to my working schedule. We love a good 3:20a clock-out.

“Keep an eye on her,” he tilts his head so Jon’s fingers scrape against the good spot at the end of his jaw. But Jon’s hand stops, and he stares at Ghost with an intensity even the direwolf can sense. “I mean it, boy. Protect her.”

Ghost opens his mouth and his tongue lolls out as he pants happily. Jon smiles and returns to petting him. Jon is to leave, to climb on a horse with two dozen others around him and leave the place Ghost had been as a pup, when there had been litter mates to play with. Ghost knows there is one other, but she is not to help them. The wolves in the forest speak of her, the ravens on the breeze scream of her.

Jon pauses on his horse, turning and raising a hand. His woman wears blue, and Ghost knows the path to her from where he sits. If he is to keep an eye on her, he must go to her now, before she is out of sight. He picks himself off his hindquarters and bounds through the open spaces where everyone watches and the closed spaces were everyone leaps from his path.

He reaches the nice woman’s side before the foul man can. Her hand rests in his fur as she watches Jon go. She stands long after Ghost has lost sight of them, though the smell of his friend remains.

“He’ll be all right,” the kind woman says. Ghost knows this. She will also be all right. Ghost will protect her.

This begins with growling at the foul man as he approaches. The kind woman tries to quiet him, but Ghost will not allow him near her.

<~|~>

“I am dangerous,” says the one Jon thinks is his favorite. She is not. When Jon dreams with him, he is happier to see the nice woman, though still happy to see the short one.

“Not to me,” says the nice one. Ghost loves that at her side, her hand is almost constantly on him, still or gently scratching with nails. He loves that she will rub circles into his face and say that he is a good hunter. Jon thinks it is stupid that he is jealous of Ghost. But Ghost does not, even having no understanding of jealousy. He knows all creatures should want the nice woman’s nice, gentle hands on them.

“How do you know that?”

“Ghost doesn’t react when you say things like that.”

His tail thumps as she gets around to the base of his ears.

“Direwolves shouldn’t be that docile.”

“Jon wargs into him while he dreams.”

“He wargs?”

“Talk to the Free Folk.”

“You mean the Wildlings.”

“A lot has changed,” the kind woman smiles. “Good to see you’ve stayed annoying.” She left his side to embrace her litter mate. “I missed you.”

The smaller one grips her back fiercely. “And I missed you.”

“Have you talked to Bran yet?”

“No.”

“You need to.”

“Why?”

“So you understand Jon and . . . So you understand things better. We all need to talk about Littlefinger.”

“Why is he still here?”

Ghost growls. He is not sure why the foul man stays, but it is easier to kill him when he is close at hand. This is what the kind one whispers to herself at night when her hands tremble and she looks as though she shall vomit. Ghost knows Jon would like to tear out the foul man’s throat while he dreams with him, knows that it would be satisfactory for the both of them. But the kind one wants him alive, so alive he stays.

“Because I want to be the one who kills him,” the kind one says, soft as snow and just as cold. “I want to be the last to look him in the eye, I want to hear his last words, I want to _know_ that he is dead.”

“You want to swing the sword.”

“They are too heavy for me.”

“This one won’t be,” the little one holds up a little stick just as small. Ghost moves forward. He can smell many bleedings there, many cleanings. He wants to take it from the little one, opening his mouth slowly and creeping forward so as not to be seen.

“Ghost,” Jon’s favorite lays her hand on his head as she takes the blade from her litter mate. Foiled. He sits at her side instead. “I don’t think I was meant to swing the sword, Arya, not in the way that Jon and Robb and Father have.”

“I heard you killed him with his own dogs.”

“I did.”

“You met his eyes, you heard his words.”

“And his screams.”

The little one smiles. Ghost knows Jon would call it feral. Wild. Free. Dangerous. “Then you swung the sword, Sansa.”

“I suppose,” she sighs. “We need to speak to Bran.”

<~|~>

Jon goes to his woman before he goes to Ghost. Ghost does not mind, for he is at her side, and Jon shall soon notice him. They embrace for a long time, though, with Jon whispering to her.

“Trust me. It’s you.”

He does not know what it is that she is.

Ghost knows the white woman from Jon’s dreams. She rides great scaled beasts Ghost has never seen before. They shall be his friends. But she shall not be. She is mean to Jon. Jon must pretend with her. He never pretends with the kind woman. If she attempts to harm the kind woman, Ghost will tear out her throat with as much glee as he tore out the foul man’s.

“I know,” she answers him. Even when they pull away from each other, they stare for a long time. Then Jon goes to the little one, then the Raven Who Knows.

“You saw Theon,” says the Raven.

“Aye.”

“Is he-“ The kind one stops, glancing at the white woman. Jon nods.

“Later.”

Where the white woman and all her friends who smell like places Ghost has never seen before cannot hear.

Ghost cannot help himself, barking at Jon. His favorite laughs, stroking his fur. Jon kneels before him. “Attention whoring beast.” Ghost licks him, neck to forehead. He is sweaty, and Ghost licks him again. “All right, all right.”

“Ghost,” Jon’s favorite calls. He backs up and looks at her. She is smiling. Perhaps she is Ghost’s favorite as well.

“That’s a large wolf,” says the white woman. Ghosts looks at her. She is in red and white. Ghost is white with red eyes. He knows this because Jon knows this. But she is not to be his friend.

The favorite’s hand tightens in his fur, and he does not growl. But he wants to.

“He’s a direwolf,” say Jon and their favorite. They meet each other’s eyes and Jon clears his throat.

“They’re almost extinct,” says their favorite.

“Dragons were thought extinct. Perhaps your direwolf shall not be the last.”

“He‘s Jon’s.”

Ghost licks her hand, for she sounds sad.

<~|~>

Jon enters the room quietly. Ghost picks his head up off the bed, watching as he approaches their favorite. They embrace, far longer than the first. Ghost lets his head fall back to his paws.

“Sam just said-“

“Bran already told us.”

They do not move from each other, Jon’s hand keeping her tight against him. Her head tucks into the crook of his neck. Ghost debates climbing off the bed to stand between them. He is neglected, he knows, for since Jon has returned, their favorite has paid him more mind than Ghost. It is a tragedy, and Ghost must make strides to correct it.

“Littlefinger,” Jon mutters. She steps away from him. “I’m sorry- I was injured and Ghost—I couldn’t control it.”

“We were executing him, Jon. Ghost was supposed to do that.”

“Oh. Oh. I didn’t want to upset you-“

“You were more concerned with upsetting me than killing him?”

Jon smiles, chuckling a little as he rubs the back of his neck. “Um, well, I didn’t like him very much, it’s no secret, Sansa.”

“You need to explain to Arya how it works,” she says.

“I’ll get around to it, I’m sure,” Jon sighs. “There’s a bigger issue.”

“What?”

“I bonded with Rhaegal in almost the same way. I think I could ride him.”

She is quiet a long time. “People will know you’re- you’re not just half-Stark, half-commoner. She’ll- What will she do?”

“I don’t know,” he says. She falls into his arms once more. “I don’t know.”

Ghost chuffs, just to remind them that he is there. If they will not pay attention to him, he will go hunt. He is hungry. He wants to meet his large, scaled friends.

“You’ve spoiled him,” Jon glares at him.

“I have not!”

“He slept in the bed with you every night!”

Their favorite does not ask how he knows this. She can tell sometimes, Ghost knows, when Jon’s thoughts swirl with Ghost’s urges. She watches Jon. “Are you jealous of Ghost?”

“Of course not!”

Ghost growls at the lie. The favorite looks at him. “He disagrees.”

“He doesn’t understand!”

Ghost yips at him, tilting his head. The favorite one grins slowly. “You hurt his feelings! Apologize.”

“I’m not apologizing to the bloody wolf.”

Ghost whined. “Jon!”


	6. *Modern*/Historical/Remix

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm sleep deprived and this is a brief reworking of a concept for a slllooooooow burn Jonsa fic I have in the works (~50K words rn)

She wore red, the sort of red that made men’s minds blank. Her lips painted the same shade. Jon didn’t know how she did that. She looked, gods, she looked perfect. He hardly even noticed Margaery beside her. Her dress was shorter than usual, too small almost. Jon doubted it was her own. It was more than likely Margaery’s. Sansa should’ve sought out more of Margaery’s clothes. They looked damn good on her.

The dress was short, and her legs were not. Jon lost his train of thought as his gaze traveled from her heels to her eyes. _Beautiful_. Holy Seven Above, she was beautiful.

He could barely speak to her when she and Margaery joined Jon, Robb, Theon, and Sam. Words just . . . failed him. But his eyes were on her too often, and too often she caught that gaze and refused to relinquish it.

She and Margaery got up to go to the bathroom at some point, and Jon watched them go. She turned to look at him over his shoulder.

“Quit eye-fucking Sansa,” Robb said, sipping at his beer. Jon felt heat pour through him.

“I’m not,” he grumbled. Eye-fucking implied thought, didn’t it? And Jon couldn’t think. He couldn’t mentally undress her because he was too obsessed with what she was physically dressed in.

That damned dress.

“No more than she’s eye-fucking him,” Theon said lightly.

“Theon.”

“She’s a consenting adult, Robb,” said Sam. “If she wants to eye-fuck men, she can.”

“Don’t my best mate though, right? That’s off limits.”

“Is she off limits to me or am I off limits to her?” Jon asked, frowning as he drank from his rye and coke.

“Yes.”

“You’re an asshole,” Jon rolled his eyes.

They all noticed the little scuffle. There was a choke point of sorts in the bar where tables lined the path to the bathrooms. People were standing in the way instead of sitting at their tables, and it’d clogged up the way. Jon could see Sansa’s bright red hair as she tried to squeeze through, flashes of honey blonde indicating Margaery was close by.

Two men started shoving each other on the end of the congestion closest to their table. Which meant Sansa and Margaery would have to go through it.

“Shit,” Robb got up. When Robb got up, they all got up. Jon followed, hot on his heels and tugging on his shirt until Theon managed to seize one arm. What normally would happen next was that Jon would grab his other hand while Sam used his larger size to push through the crowd and retrieve the ladies.

But the crowd parted in time for Jon to see a hand splaying between Sansa’s legs from behind, a male hand.

It was like he’d teleported. One second he was behind Robb, the next beside Sansa, his arm reared back and following through a man’s jaw. Sansa grabbed his other hand, trying to pull him back, but Jon hit him again.

“Jon.”

Margaery slipped between them, pushing Jon backward.

“Fuck.”

<~|~>

“I wanted to thank you,” Sansa said quietly. Jon looked up at her. He hadn’t spoken much all night, but it’d become even worse once they’d fled the bar and wandered back across town to the car. Her brother was off pissing in a bush somewhere and Sam had offered to take Theon home. Margaery had found a man. So, she was alone in the car with Jon.

“Don’t thank me,” Jon muttered. “It was stupid.”

“All the same,” Sansa cleared her throat. _I have a massive crush on you and that has upgraded to a massive lady boner because hot fuck no one has ever stood up for me like that._ “Thanks, Jon. I owe you.”

“Nah.”

“Yep.”

“Sansa, it’s fine, really.”

“I’ll kick a girl between the legs for you next time it’s required,” Sansa offered. Jon turned to look at her, giving her a dry sort of gaze with an eyebrow arched. “If you want.”

His eyes swept down her form, sitting in the driver’s seat, trying not to check and see if her dress was riding up once again. Margaery had bought it for her, and it was very much _not_ her style. “All the favors to owe me, and you go with that?”

“It’s equivalent,” Sansa shrugged. She bit her lip, thinking carefully. Should she . . . Did she dare . . . _Fuck it._ “I’m also open to other things.”

“Oh? Like what?”

“The usual things guy mean when they want to trade favors.”

Jon was quiet a long moment, his eyes boring into hers. She kept herself still, trying not to give her nervousness away. Her cheeks heated slowly.

“Robb wouldn’t like that.”

“And Robb is the boss of you?”

“When it comes to you, maybe a little.”

Sansa snorted. “You think my brother gets to have a say in what I do with whom?”

“I don’t think he has a say in what you do, I do think he has a say in how kills me afterward,” Jon’s lips quirked into that half-smile of his. He really was gorgeous. And ripped. And wonderfully tattooed. And rode a motorcycle when the weather allowed it. And he’d beaten a man’s face in for her. And his hair was dark and long and curly.

Her mom hated him.

Sansa didn’t.

“Jon.”

“What?”

“If I promise not to tell Robb, will you-“

“If we’re not telling Robb, I’d do just about anything.

<~|~>

Three months later and all the things Sansa had tried to get her stupid crush out of her system had backfired. Jon wasn’t just good in bed, he was amazing. He listened when she talked about her coworkers and her day. He let her watch _Pride and Prejudice_ and let her hide against him when he put on scary movies. He bought her ice cream when she mentioned something had gone wrong at work.

“How’d you get so perfect?” Jon murmured into her bared throat. Sansa shook her head, wrapping her arms tighter around him.

“It’s you. You’re the perfect one.”

“Can we tell Robb yet?”

“What if he ruins things? He’s good at ruining things for me.”

“That’s exaggerating. He’s good at _accidentally_ ruining things for you.”

Sansa laughed against him. “We’re going out on Friday. Want to do it then?”

“Before or after I fuck you in the bathroom?”

“Jon.”

“Mm, after.”

“Definitely after.”


	7. Bastards/Royalty/Free Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhaegar wins AU, with an added bit of spicy Independent North. Jon meets Sansa in the Vale, and their fathers take strides to ensure the Six Kingdoms remain Six, and the North remains free but an ally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all I could've gone on forever on this one, might merit coming back to at a later date but I'm already working on one AU slow burn Jonsa boyo so *shrugs*

He is the Heir to the Six Kingdoms when he meets Winterfell’s eldest princess. His older half-brother vanished and presumed dead in an attempted Lannister coup. Jon took Lord Tywin’s head himself. Rhaenys had been married off, kicking and screaming, to the young lord of the Vale. Jon had tried to convince their father to delay, but it was an impossible task.

But, Rhaegar’s coin had landed long ago, and they did not know of Jon or Rhaenys’s. For some reason, this made Rhaenys more of a risk.

Jon had visited her thrice since her marriage. Young Robyn was yet a boy, and Rhaenys hadn’t let him touch her. Jon honestly believed he was more likely to legitimize a bastard in the next few years than see her bear an Arryn.

The Lord’s young son demanded that Jon see the Moon Door opened, and it was in that room that Jon first saw her.

Lord Arryn and his Tully wife sat over the room, the young lordling down amongst his knights, close enough to the Moon Door that his mother visibly fretted. An older lad trailed the boy, no doubt tasked with grabbing him if he fell or otherwise keeping him from harm. They were waiting for Rhaenys to come swooping in, far more beautiful than anyone else in the Vale, by any possible standard.

But before his sister arrived, Lysa introduced her brother-in-law, Ned Stark. Jon’s eyes could not leave him, even as wind filled the room with howls. Ned Stark. His uncle. His mother’s last blood. Jon had never before realized how much he looked like a Stark. But the hair, the eyes, most of the face, even the skin. He was Jon Targaryen, but he bore the Stark blood more obviously.

For this was not just his uncle. It was the King in the North. His retinue was small, lingering in the shadows. Jon’s mother’s last gift to her house was their kingdom. Though strongly advised against it, his father felt it sent a clear message: _I loved her. I didn’t steal her. I didn’t rape her. _Rhaegar had seen to it the North became sovereign. It was not a young kingdom, by many accounts it was the oldest of all Westeros. And Ned Stark was not unseasoned, either in politics or battle.

“The King in the North.”

Jon inclined his head. “Your majesty.”

“Your highness,” Ned Stark answered in kind.

“Shh!”

Jon looked up at his sister’s voice, and found her and another woman entering the room behind the Lord’s chair, arm in arm, giggling like the thickest of thieves. His sister looked in better spirits than she’d been the last time he’d visited.

But Jon couldn’t pay much attention to his sister as she entered. The woman at her side—copper-haired, beautiful, tall and willowy and in the most intricately embroidered pale grey gown, her cheeks flushed with color and her blue eyes bright with mirth. She and Rhaenys whispered back and forth to each other until Rhaenys finally saw Jon.

His sister flew across the pale stones, and he was holding her in a heartbeat.

His eyes remained locked with her companion until Rhaenys pulled away. She cupped Jon’s cheeks in her hands. “The beard suits you well. You’re getting to be handsome, brother.”

“Thank you,” Jon cleared his throat. His face burned as she patted his cheeks. Her smile widened.

“Oh! This is my friend,” she moved to Jon’s side. The beautiful woman stepped forward. “Princess Sansa Stark, the Northern King’s eldest daughter.”

She curtsied, and then Jon had her hand in his and his lips were pressing to the back of her hand. Color bloomed high in her cheeks as he held her gaze. He should’ve let her go but couldn’t.

“A pleasure, my lady.”

“The pleasure is mine, my lord.”

Gods, even her voice was beautiful.

“We’re traveling to Storm’s End, for the trade accords,” said King Stark. King Ned? If all the Northern Kings were Starks, was he then King Ned? Or rather, King Eddard? They wouldn’t call Jon ‘King Targaryen.’

Jon realized much too late that the princess’s hand was still in his. He gently released her, squaring his shoulders and straightening. She was yet taller than him.

“Jon is going to the accords as well, representing our father,” Rhaenys dug her elbow into Jon’s side. “Perhaps he can escort you?”

“With the hill tribes as they are, it might be safer,” Jon agreed. The Knights of the Vale stiffened at the words. Jon cleared his throat, “They know they’ll have no luck against the might of the Vale, but our banners are strange to them, and they do not yet fear them.”

“They’ll learn to fear wolf and dragon alike then,” said Sansa Stark. Jon smiled.

“So they shall.”

Jon felt Ned Stark’s eyes on him, and forced himself to look away from Sansa’s pretty blue eyes. Ned Stark’s eyes were grey, dark. His mouth twitched and Jon couldn’t decipher its exact meaning. “I’ll have it arranged.”

“Mummy, can I go too?” Robyn Arryn cried abruptly. Jon had quite forgotten he was there. Rhaenys sighed loudly, and Sansa covered a smile with her hand.

“Come, brother, I’ll show you about,” Rhaenys fit her arm into Jon’s, dragging his feet forward, closer to Sansa. He glanced at her father before clearing his throat and offering his arm to her.

“Would you like to join us, Princess?”

“I’d be delighted.”

<~|~>

Sansa Stark did not expect herself to like the Southern King-to-be very much. She’d always heard that Southerners were a bit off, a bit too self-involved, a bit too greedy, a bit too lustful. But Jon wasn’t any of those things. He was really quite lovely.

Her father didn’t ever want to talk about him, but he didn’t ask her to stop seeing him either. They rode beside each other during the days of traveling, and he and her father pitched their tents near to each other, at the center of any encampment made, and she was always between them. At any meals, they ate together. Jon listened to her talk about the North with near ravenous attentions. He had far less to say about the South, but what he spoke of sounded beautiful. Sansa found herself longing for the striking vision of the Red Keep against the sea, of King’s Landing and the old Dragonpit and the Great Sept of Baelor.

“My mother holds the Seven,” said Sansa. “But we Starks have always prayed to the Old Gods, at the weirwood trees.” Jon nodded, his arm in hers as they wandered about the encampment as it went up. No less than four guards trailed them, half Jon’s men, half her own. Well, not her own, really, but the ones her father usually trusted her with. “The Children of the Forest carved faces into the trees, and their leaves are always the most brilliant shade of red—there’s a terrible time trying to get dyes even close so anyone could paint it.”

“There’s a weirwood tree in King’s Landing, in the Red Keep, I mean. There’s a little- uhm, you said it was a godswood, right?”

“Yes.”

“We have a godswood, though it’s normally just called the Weirwood Temple, with the weirwood right in the heart of it. Father still goes there when he misses my mother,“ Jon said softly. “We always start and end my name day there.”

Sansa ducked her head, patting his arm in what she hoped was a soothing manner. He didn’t say anything, even as they moved toward the outskirts of camp.

“I apologize, I didn’t mean to dour our talk,” said Jon. Sansa smiled, leaning into him.

“It’s quite all right. You’re one of us, Jon. You’re as much a Stark as I am a Tully,” she said.

“My Stark blood doesn’t matter.”

He said it with the practiced ease of a man due to inherit titles. Sansa came to a stop, tugging him with her, a hand on his elbow. “You’ll be King of the Six Kingdoms. The second King of the Six Kingdoms to include Dorne and not the North. But you’re why the North is free. You’re how the North stays free—if even the half-Stark King doesn’t lay claim to the North, how could any who follow?”

He stared at her hand for a moment before his dark grey eyes met hers. There were specs of violet there. “But what if my coin lands the other way?”

Sansa struggled for a moment to understand him, the storm in his eyes too distracting to aid in rational thought. So, she just said, “It won’t.”

His jaw clenched, and he looked out along the forest lining the edge of the encampment. “We should go back.”

She met his eyes again. He did not soften, his gaze quickly falling back to the forest. Sansa took a deep breath. If he wanted to ignore her advice, he may as well just ignore her on the whole. She released his elbow, slightly mortified to realize she hadn’t done so sooner, and walked past him toward one of the little paths branching off the road.

“Where are you going?” Jon called. Her father’s men followed her silently, allowing her to peer between them as she walked backwards a few paces.

“Away from you.”

“Princess.”

She bobbed into a bad imitation of a curtsey. Arya could have done better. “Prince Jon.” She turned back around. A walk could clear her head. At home, she and Arya would often walk the Wolfswood near Winterfell in silence after a day of argument. An hour of quiet, cooperative navigation was more reliable an apology between them than any words could be. Her mother the Queen often said her children all suffered from a need to be right, as much a moral attribute as it was a conversational detriment.

“Princess, I meant what I said, the Hill Tribes are dangerous and should not be provoked!”

She could tell from the moderate proximity of his voice and the multitude of footsteps that he and his men were following her. She did not acknowledge his statement. Rhaenys and Robyn had both said the Hill Tribes had become so reclusive as to border on the mythical. They had entertained a brief rebellion after Robert’s, but the Mountain and the Vale were yet one of the Six Kingdoms, and Targaryen soldiers combined with the Knights of the Vale had put an efficient end to it.

“As much as I hate to agree with a Southron,” muttered Jory, “The Hill Tribes are not likely to offer you tea, my lady.”

“Jory, the odds of me _stumbling_ upon a Hill Tribe contingent brave enough to attack so near to our encampment are astronomical.”

“Unless they’ve been following us, and mean to pick off strays,” Alyn said. Sansa cut her eyes at him. He raised his eyebrows. “Expert in the people of the Vale as well as military strategy now, my lady?”

“Princess!”

“Shit!”

Swords were unsheathed and because Sansa was the single unluckiest human who’d ever left Winterfell, she looked away from Alyn just in time to see a dozen strangers in strange furs carrying an odd assortment of weapons creeping forward. Alyn yanked her behind him, drawing his sword hastily. Her view was blocked by black cloaks embroidered with red thread. But Jon did not hide with her, surrounded by the guards, five in total. He stood between Jory and Alyn. The forest stilled around them. The wild looking men had them almost surrounded, a semi-circle blocking the path.

“If she runs, we can draw some of the fuckers away,” said one of the Targaryens.

“She’s not bait,” Jon bit back.

“You should both run,” Jory said.

“You need my sword.”

“I need my king’s daughter to live.”

“Say that a little louder, let them take her hostage,” said another of the Targaryens threw his teeth. “I’m sure he’d be thrilled with you then.”

“Osfryd,” Jon said sharply.

“All in favor of the royals running, say aye,” said Alyn. Five ayes followed.

“Yes, except since we are royals, as you say, we don’t have to listen,” Sansa said. “If Jon says-“

“Jon, since you obviously care little for your own life would you do us all a favor and think of the Princess’s?!” Jon looked at his guard a long moment. He had been with them since leaving the Eerie. Sansa thought she knows his name. Daemon, perhaps. He looked Dornish, Sansa thought, though paler than Rhaenys. What she could see of his hair was dark and curling and textured in a way that Jon’s wild hair wasn’t.

Jon met her eyes and she knew he’d reconsidered. She didn’t know how she could tell just from the look on his face. But it was as obvious as reading a text. She wished he would take her hand and pull her away, but his sword is too large for one hand. She will have to trust that he is behind her.

“Now.”

Sansa didn’t like running. She was a Lady. Ladies didn’t run in full skirts through woods. That was more her sister’s style. Certainly not hers.

But she ran, her feet flying across the ground, down the slight slope she hadn’t even noticed going up. She ran and heard Jon behind her, could hear others as well. She could see the tents, could see men milling about. She didn’t have the air in her lungs to scream. She couldn’t wave her arms for she needed them to keep her legs moving, to keep her balanced as she ran.

Then her feet stopped moving, her ankles caught and bound together. She fell to the ground, groaning as she landed hard on one shoulder. Metal sang as she wiggled from her front to her back, sitting up and pulling at the weighted ties around her legs. Stones and a rope. She wanted to curse herself as her fingers struggled to find purchase anywhere. Even more so when she saw Jon exchanging blows with two of the Hill Tribe.

It was nothing compared to the feeling that overcame her when she saw a third approaching her, a sickening grin splitting his face.

Sansa prayed nonsense as her fingers scrambled to undo the knot around her ankles. There had to be a way of undoing it. There had to be. Had to be.

“Sansa!”

She looked up at the barbarian, eyes watering with her own inability to act. If she had a dagger, could she save herself? What would Arya do?

Arya would spit at the man, but Sansa could not bring herself to.

She just followed the lines of ropes with her fingers.

And prayed because she was about to die.

Or worse, be taken away from here.

The tip of a sword burst from the man’s chest, and Sansa gasped as blood sprayed over her. Jon grunted, and she gaped as he removed the sword and kicked the man away, into the grass. He cut her bindings and hauled her up with one hand, drawing her against him as he raised his blade.

Sansa shuddered in his grip, holding tightly to him. She could see their guards racing toward them, blood stained, one or two limping. But it was all five of them nonetheless. And Jon had just dispatched of two. So, they were not good fighters, perhaps, when compared to the civilized training of the Knights of Westeros.

The arrows came from no where, pelting the man, a dozen all at once. Sansa buried her head in Jon’s shoulder.

Three hours later, her father and Jon were talking. She didn’t know what of. But their laughter was audible across camp.

She would never forget the moment he appeared before her, blood on his blade, to save her like heroes saved maidens in songs.

<~|~>

“Father, you must be joking!”

“I’m not.”

“But I- She’s- She’s never been so far South before, you can’t just-“

“I’ve come to an agreement with Ned Stark,” said Rhaegar. “We agree it’ll help keep peace now and in the future.”

Jon turned his back to his father, his hands digging into his hair. He was supposed to marry Sansa Stark—marry her. Marry her. First, he took Rhaenys from her home, now they were tearing Sansa from hers? Jon wanted to scream at him. He didn’t want to see Sansa hurt, he certainly didn’t want her thinking about him the way Rhaenys thought of Robyn. He wanted to know her before the whole kingdom watched him bed her, he wanted her to be willing.

He’d spent every day for three fortnights with her, and to say he was infatuated would be putting it mildly. After the incident with the Hill Tribes, they were barely apart from each other, and she was often on his arm as they wandered Storm’s End between treating. While she never spoke during the sessions, Jon could tell she listened, and when they were alone, she was bold. Gods, she was bold, claiming this lord stupid and that one near-sighted. Her opinions on the Freys were so vile he knew they must be inherited from her father, or even her mother.

He saw her to her chambers every night before bed. He arrived the next morning to break the fast with her. He never set a single foot in her rooms. He couldn’t ruin her reputation, to do so just to see her scorned and casted aside just to collect her himself was cruel. He just wanted to be with her every second he could. Her father had no complaints, always smiling fondly. Once, just once, he’d taken Jon aside and spoken of his mother, or what Rhaegar might not know from her childhood.

Sansa was right. He’d never invade the North for some stupid claim. If his mother loved the North that much, wanted it free so badly, he couldn’t take it back. They deserved their independence.

He didn’t see her when she got to the capitol. His uncle Viserys had him stuck in the training yards all day, laughing and taunting him as Jon pressed for information, only to learn that the King and his daughter and their retinue had arrived when Viserys had called him to the yard. Jon wanted to cut his smug head off his shoulders at that.

He kept running into her father every time he wandered toward her rooms. The King talked about a variety of things, but always squared himself such that there was no hiding that Jon’s presence was unwelcome. She fell unwell not long after, they told him, suffering for the first time a truly Southern climate. Jon wanted to see her. He wanted things to be as they had been before, but he couldn’t even see her at meals, as she and her father dined on their own. He punched a wall one night. The guard known as Daemon berated him for it all the next week.

He found himself in the godswood more often, especially at night. He didn’t know what to do with himself. Sleep came infrequently, and his mind often spun around every possible way it could all go wrong. Everyone acted as though he should be happy—a beautiful wife was being handed to him. But he didn’t want a wife _handed to him_.

Jon knelt in the grass before the weirwood tree, looking at the face carved in the white bark. Red sap leaked from the eyes, giving the face tears to complement its already agonized expression. He touched his hands to the dirt, idly grinding it across his fingers.

His mother had fled her intended marriage. Her father had nearly gotten Elia killed when he abandoned her. If Jon never loved Sansa, if she never loved him . . . Would there be war again? His father spoke so sparingly of it, but Jon had no wish for it. Ser Barristan had trained him well, by any account, but he had no yearning for glory upon battlefields.

And this war—it would be his kin. Starks and their banner men.

No, he would not allow it. It was his duty to protect the Six Kingdoms.

If Sansa wouldn’t love him, fine. But he wouldn’t dishonor her. He wouldn’t give anyone the chance to say things fell apart because of him.

He didn’t care if he had to bypass the King in the North himself; the next day, he’d see his betrothed.

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

As though summoned by thought alone, there she stood, her copper hair hidden by a pale blue hood. Jon stood and faced her hastily, bowing. She curtseyed in answer. Jon stared at her skin, soft and creamy under the light of the moon. Her hands folded neatly in front of her.

“Would you like me to go?” Jon asked softly.

“I haven’t seen you in months,” Sansa smiled. Jon nodded. She fidgeted slightly. “How are you?”

“Well, all things considered.”

Sansa’s smile vanished. She looked down at her feet. “Oh. Sorry.”

Jon stepped forward, aching to touch her. “I- I’m sorry about . . . All this. I didn’t ask for them to . . .”

“You don’t want to marry me.”

“I-“ Jon cleared his throat. Why did she sound so disappointed? Rhaenys had to be dragged out of the Red Keep to go to the Eerie, was Sansa not equally upset to be torn from her home? Hope fluttered in his chest despite himself. Perhaps she wanted him. Or wanted him to want her. The latter was . . . He should tell her-

“I should go back-“

“Wait,” Jon came closer again. He watched her swallow. He watched her face, too, trying to identify any of the nerves that currently plagued him. “I just- I don’t want to marry you if you’re going to resent me for it the rest of our lives. I like being your friend. I don’t- I don’t want that to change because- well, because . . . You’re stuck with me, and they’ll all ask for your head if you stray.”

Her eyes lined with tears as she lifted her head. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

Jon’s face scrunched. “I haven’t. I went looking for you but- you’re never where I’m told you’re supposed to be, I’m always running into your father- They said you were unwell-“

“You weren’t even there to welcome us to the city-“

“My uncle said it- I- I wasn’t informed you were here until you were _here_.” Jon growled. The urge to throttle his uncle abruptly resurged.

Sansa frowned at him. And Jon frowned at her. She spoke slowly, “They’ve been keeping you from seeing me?”

Jon swallowed. “I guess so.”

Sansa looked past him, her eyes on the weirwood. “My mother was supposed to marry my uncle. But he died and . . . She married Father instead. They didn’t hardly know each other, but their love is stronger than any I’ve seen. They built it from nothing.”

“Rhaenys hates Robyn, and his family. I don’t want you to hate me. Kings and Queens who hate each other . . . They bring the Realm down with them.”

Sansa took his hand, tugging him back toward the weirwood tree. Her eyes shone brightly. “Then let us swear our oaths before the Heart Tree. Not of protection or fealty or marriage. I’ll vow not to hate you, and you’ll vow not to hate me.”

“Do you think it’s so simple?” Jon asked. Sansa nodded. He found himself smiling. “Should I start?”

“If you want.”

“I vow not to ever hate you, to avoid being cruel to you, to endeavor away from harming you,” Jon said quietly. Sansa smiled, her blush brightening her cheeks even in the dark. “I promise I will love you more fiercely than anyone before me, that I will earn your love and give mine freely, from this day, to my last day.”

“I vow not to hate you,” Sansa whispered. “I vow to be worthy of any love bestowed upon me, and to show you that you are worthy of the same.”

Jon glanced at the tree’s weeping eyes. “Is there anything else the old gods require?”

“Yes,” Sansa squeezed his hand. “Kiss me.”

“Sansa,” Jon said tightly. He should. Her eyes were bright as she went her lips. He shouldn’t. What if they didn’t stop? There had to be a bedding ceremony and if she didn’t bleed, the union was jeopardized.

Jon nearly pinched himself. She asked for a kiss, no more. No more.

His hands cupped her face and he leaned closer, watching as her eyes fluttered close. His nose bumped hers, then his lips ghosted across hers. She gripped his arms and pulled him closer. He pressed more firmly against her.

He pulled away before he could lose any more rational thought. She looked at him with eyes of blue steel. “You’re beautiful.”

“They say it’ll take months for the wedding to be properly planned,” Sansa said. “What if we just . . . Spent time with each other, as we did in the Vale and Storm’s End?”

Jon smiled. “I like this idea of yours.”

“Good,” she kissed him softly.


End file.
